The Cisco Kid was here. Harry opened his eyes and saw the words in the faint light as he did every morning. They were etched on the ceiling, put there with a hard implement by someone before his time in the apartment.

It was still dark out—it always seemed to be so in this part of the world at this time of day. Perpetual cloud-cover and precipitation conspired to blot out all but the most intense efforts of the sun.

He rolled to the edge of the bed and sat there on the corner of the mattress feeling the cool air of his studio prickling his skin. Most days he would have struggled to the bathroom where there was a built-in space heater that would afford him minimal warmth until he was dressed.

Today he stood and went to the window and shoved the curtains wide, brightening the room by only a shade or two. Even the light was cold.

He stood before the glass in his boxers and looked down at the city. Already people were rushing to work. From his vantage they reminded him of cells in a clogged vascular system, working their way around various clots and clogs, reproducing and co-mingling until the eventual infarct. He watched for a long time until his alarm blared from across the room and drew him away from the window.

He went to the nightstand and turned off the alarm. The green numbers, blinking in time with the beeps, steadied their glow to something constant.

Tapping his fingers against the metal surface of the stand, he wondered about the alarm. He never woke without a stimulus. Except for today.

Going to the bathroom he watched his reflection in the mirror, almost expecting it to say something. He touched the flesh beneath his eyes, pressing the dark crescents there, the soft skin yielding to his touch.

Out of habit he turned to close the door. He stopped, however, at the sight of his bed. One corner of the sheets on the side where he'd slept was thrown back, the pillow still indented from the weight of his head. The rest of the bed was smooth, as though a body had not occupied it at all. He wondered at its emptiness, trying to remember if it had always been that way.

When he couldn't remember he shut the door and went about his morning bathroom ritual. When he was nearly done he bent to a cabinet below the sink and brought out a tiny bag with remnants of white powder in it. He poured what little there was out on the counter and chopped it into lines with a razor he'd removed from its plastic handle long ago. Flecks of rust were starting to show on the blade. He considered them for a moment, wondering if blood really looked like rust when it dried. Everyone always said it did. He bent and snorted the lines with a cut straw he kept with the bag. The physical sensation was immediate, but the mental jolt, the real wake-up, didn't come. It hadn't in a long time. He wiped his face with a damp towel and prepared to shower.

When he was finished, he opened the door and emerged, newly dressed, wrapped in pressed fabric and reeking of shampoo. His face still stung faintly from the scrape of the razor. Tears threatened at the corners of his eyes from the sensation. He'd always had a sensitive face and this was the normal response. Brushing away the water he went to where he had set his briefcase the night before and picked it up and left the apartment, double-checking the lock after latching the door behind him.

He took the stairs to the bottom floor, avoiding the elevator, which would be packed this time of the morning. Emerging from the stairwell on the ground floor he let go of the door and winced when it slammed behind him.

Clarice, his neighbor, who was currently checking her mail in the lobby, glanced up and gave him an annoyed look. He smiled at her and raised his fingers in a wave. She scowled harder and went back to sorting her mail.

Outside the sun had little effect on the temperature. He wanted to shove his hands in his pockets and hold the fabric of his jacket closed, but it was hard to do with a sport coat. Especially when it was cheaply manufactured and didn't have real pockets, only flaps on the sides to create the illusion.

The bus stop was three blocks away and he started toward it. A gust of wind kicked up and he walked against it for a minute or two, head bent low, body forward. The chill he'd awakened with intensified as the wind cut through the thin fabric of his clothes and bit at his flesh.

The breeze was short lived, and he was able to walk upright again, though the cold remained. His nose was running and he sniffled, hoping to stem the tide before a Kleenex was needed.

He came to an intersection and stood next to a young woman who was pushing a stroller. Glancing down he saw the dozing face of an infant. It was a girl, he decided from the tiny pink bow applied to the wisp of hair atop the baby's head. He wouldn't have been able to tell otherwise. The rest of the child was swaddled in blankets. He found himself jealous of the comfort.

Looking at the mother he saw she was tired. She couldn't have been older than thirty, maybe even mid-twenties, but the fatigue she wore added ten years to her features. Crow's feet from a perpetual squint showed around the corners of her eyes. Dark circles that mimicked his own partially circumvented each of her eyes.

As he eyed her she sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose and briefly rubbed the spot. The shift in her position revealed that she carried a load of groceries in the arm that wasn't holding the stroller. Five bags were clutched in the one hand.

"Good morning," he said.

She stopped pinching her nose and looked at him, saying nothing.

He smiled, but she flicked her eyes away.

Harry turned back to face the opposing light. Traffic was thinner than normal this morning. Maybe due to the cold weather. It was always took a week or two between the change from warm to cold for people to adjust. In that time there were always several sick calls. Harry never called in sick.

The woman was bending down, checking on her baby. When she straightened he said, "She's cute."

She looked at him again as if surprised to see he still stood next to her.

Smiling again, he said, "Really, she looks comfy."

The woman's face darkened and she said, "Just back off, 'kay?"

Surprise almost caused him to actually take a step backward, but he caught himself. He felt no different than if she'd slapped him. Somehow she'd read him wrong.

"I was going to offer some help with your groceries," he said, but the light had changed, and she was already striding away. She quickened her pace when he spoke, covering the rest of the crosswalk at a fast trot.

Harry remained on the corner, stung and unsure. A bus whooshed past him carrying with it its own wake of air that shook him when it hit, banging his briefcase against his knee and flapping the corners of his jacket.

He waited until the light turned green again, and he crossed the street alone.

His bus was about the pull away from the curb when he arrived. He ran the last few yards and slapped at the door to get the bus-driver's attention. The man behind the wheel looked his way disinterestedly and for a moment Harry was sure the driver planned to drive away regardless. Then there was a hiss followed by a creak and the door folded open for him.

He stepped inside and nodded to the driver. "Thanks."

The driver turned away and didn't reply.

Harry reached into his pocket for bus fare and found only fabric. He tried the other pocket with the same result. Kneeling, he clicked open his briefcase and fumbled amongst the papers, searching.

Someone cleared his or her throat from the seats behind him. Harry turned and nodded and the crowd. "Sorry."

Vacant stares met his gaze and he went back to scrambling in his briefcase for change, knowing he wouldn't find any.

"I need fare if you're gonna ride."

The bus driver was staring down at him.

"I know. I'm sorry, I must've left it home."

"If you can't pay you need to get off."

Harry looked behind him at the other passengers, hoping one had heard and would step forward with some change. No one was looking at him anymore. Turning back to the driver he raised his eyebrows hopefully. The aging face returning his gaze was impassive.

Suddenly he was very aware of how hard the floor was on his bent knee. The air seemed to have risen in temperature in the last minute. He was no longer cold. Wiping his hand across his forehead he said, "Don't suppose you could let it slide this once?"

The driver shook his head back and forth once, reached over and pulled the door lever, and the familiar hiss-creak sounded. Harry studied the driver's face, then dropped his gaze and wordlessly shut his briefcase. He stood, the flush on his face refusing to dissipate, and stepped off the bus.

Growling, the bus's engine revved as it pulled away from the curb and left Harry standing in a cloud of exhaust. The fumes were choking and caused his eyes to tear up. Wiping at them with his free hand he began to walk away from the bus stop and was soon caught up in the flow of the crowd.

He was almost two hours late. His office was on the sixth floor, and he took the elevator this time, standing in back beside an older man who spoke quietly into a cell phone. The conversation had the hurried sound of people exchanging little more than important numbers and related details. On his other side was a woman in a business suit who glanced at her watch every few seconds. Both of them smelled nice. Harry found himself wanting to take a subtle whiff of himself to see if he measured up. He resisted the urge.

At his floor he stepped out, leaving the important people behind him, and walked into the room of cubicles that was his only reason for living, barely registering the ding of closing elevator doors behind him.

No one noticed as he made his way to the six-by-six square of space to which he was assigned. There were no notes asking him to stop by the boss's office. He sat down and dialed the number to check his messages. The automated female voice on the other end told him he had no new messages.

His INBOX had grown by about two-thirds since he'd left it last night. "Hey guys, Harry's not here," he said. "Someone's got to pick up his slack; who's up?"

No one replied, and he grinned.

Turning he faced his monitor and stared at his reflection. The dark screen offered even less than his mirror had a few hours ago. Unmoving he continued to watch himself in the screen for a long time. Every so often a coworker he didn't recognize would stop by and, without saying anything, place more paper in the INBOX. Harry wondered if it was normal to work fourteen years in the same place and not recognize most of the faces that you encountered there.

He wasn't aware of time passing for the most part, but after a while his eyes wandered over the minimalist cubicle and came to rest on the sole decoration in the space: a picture of his ex-girlfriend, Kim.

It had been taken almost eight years ago. He had snapped it on impulse with his cell phone as they'd walked to his car after he'd taken her to dinner. She'd looked happy—a look of quiet contentment. She'd blushed when, after her asking, he'd explained why he'd done it. He'd wanted to take another picture of her then, but instead he'd driven her to home and they'd spent the rest of the evening making love.

She had not been his only relationship, or his last. Time had caused the reason for the breakup to fade into something dim and hazy, and even when he looked at the picture most times his mind didn't wander into the past. He'd held on to it, though. Until now he hadn't bothered to wonder why.

Before he was really aware of it, his hand was clutching the phone while his other was dialing a number he thought he'd long since forgotten.

He felt no rush of nervous energy as he brought the receiver to his ear and heard it begin to ring on the other end. His heart rate was normal, his breathing even. The phone rang six times and kicked over to an answering machine. Her voice never came on the line, even to tell him that, hey, it was Kimberly, and please leave a message.

The voice he did get was female, but it was automated and told him in its generic tone that the resident was away.

A harsh beep sounded and he opened his mouth to speak and found he had forgotten what he wanted to say. He faltered for another few seconds, then cleared his throat and said, "I think of you when you were happy. It gets me through."  

He hung up.

By noon the stack of papers in his INBOX had risen by a full two inches. When one o'clock rolled around the stack toppled after fresh papers were added.

Harry eyed the fallen paper mountain on his desk listlessly. He looked up at the person who had contributed the final pieces. Two huge eyes glared back at him through thick spectacles from beneath an unkempt mop of red hair. The face was chubby and Harry realized, without surprise, he had never seen this person before.

"Tired of working?" the chubby face said.

"Yes."

"You look tired in general."

"I am."

"You should do something about it."

Chubby-Face tapped the top of Harry's cubicle twice and walked off. Harry straightened the remaining papers in the INBOX, then scooped what remained on his desk into the trash. In another hour the stack had risen to rival the one that had crumbled before it.

Harry skipped lunch. He hadn't clocked in today; it wouldn't matter if he took an hour off or not. He remained at his desk, letting his eyes wander at random.

It was nearly the end of his shift when he took the entire pile of papers awaiting his attention and fed them one by one into the office shredder. No one seemed to notice when the machine made its buzzing sound every few seconds for twenty minutes.

Finished with his paper-shredding Harry went back to his cubicle, grabbed a sticky-note and wrote, The Cisco Kid was here, and pasted it to his computer monitor.

He left the office without anyone questioning why he left early.

At the bottom floor he found a familiar face—the woman from the elevator—and asked her for some change for bus fare. He couldn't read her nametag.

She looked him up and down and Harry felt his face flush. He felt like a beggar. Finally she nodded and produced a few shiny quarters from her purse. Harry suspected that if something this woman owned could shine, it did.

He thanked her and walked the single block to he bus stop. The bus driver was the same one he had encountered this morning. The driver gave him a look as he climbed aboard. "You got change this time?"

Harry's cheeks burned. He put the quarters given him by the familiar-looking woman into the designated slot and listened to them clank amongst the change already there. He went to his seat, feeling the driver's gaze bore into the back of his neck.

He sat next to a young man with a red Mohawk. The kid didn't look at him as he sat down, just stared straight ahead as Harry had more or less done all day.

It was cold on the bus. The heater didn't appear to be working today. Harry wondered if it would have been just as comfortable—and cheaper—to walk home.

A hiss of brakes sounded, and the driver's voice came over the loudspeaker, announcing Harry's stop. Harry climbed out of his seat and shuffled forward quickly with his briefcase. He was the only one who stood to get off. The driver said something snide as Harry left the bus, but Harry couldn't quite make out the words.

He filed in with the crowd of people moving his direction on the sidewalk and made it the last three blocks with the din of the city serving to encapsulate him in his own silence.

Fatigue hit him halfway up the stairs and he had to stop and rest. As he stood there clutching the rail and wheezing just bit, he thought again of his picture of Kim. He'd left it behind in the office and he suddenly wished he'd remembered to take it with him. Someone else would undoubtedly find it tomorrow or the next day when they realized he was gone (they would realize, wouldn't they?).

He wondered what they would do with it. Would they keep it, enjoying the pretty girl smiling at them from the picture?

No, he decided. The picture would be trashed. A frugal person might keep the frame, but he doubted it.

In a strange sort of way, these thoughts gave him the strength to make it up the last couple flights of stairs to his floor. He wanted to stop thinking about these things, and the only way to do that was to Just Get On With It.

Inside his apartment he placed his briefcase in its traditional spot by the door. He removed his coat and tie and hung them up in the closet.

The small plastic bag he'd emptied this morning was in its spot under the sink. He flushed it down the toilet and carefully wiped down the sink and surrounding areas. He didn't want anyone to know he'd developed a drug habit in the last years of his life.

Back in the main room he looked around trying to notice if he'd forgotten anything. Nothing came to him and he went to the door and gave a last look at the space he'd occupied for the last God-knew-how-long.

The inscription on the ceiling caught his eye and an idea struck him. He went to the kitchen, grabbed a pairing knife, and returned to his bed. He stood, a bit unsteadily, on the old mattress and found he could just barely reach the spot where The Cisco Kid was here was inscribed. With the knife he scratched but no one noticed behind it.

He grinned at his work, wondering if anyone would get it.

He put the knife away and left the apartment after leaving the key on the nightstand and locking the door behind him.

At the end of the hallway the elevator beckoned. Ignoring it he went to the stairs and began his ascent. If one was going to leap from the top of his apartment building, one did not take the elevator.

The lock on the door allowing access to the roof was broken, as it had been since Harry had moved in. He came up here frequently, enjoying the solitude.

Stepping out onto the gravel roof, hearing the stuff crunch and crackle under his footsteps, he noticed the air up here was still. The violent gusts of wind seemed relegated to stay lower to the ground today.

It seemed like an appropriate thing to remove his shoes, so he did. The stones were sharp against the soles of his feet, but not unbearable.

Late afternoon had settled into dusk while he'd been in his apartment. Lavender painted the sky next to the horizon, which still held on to its fiery orange. To the south, cumulus clouds could still be seen. They would pass by far away and leave the city untouched, though an identical front would hit here soon enough. It was that time of year.

Harry inhaled, letting the crisp, autumn-scented air fill his lungs. He loved this season; it had been his favorite since childhood. He could never explain why; it just was.

He went to the edge of the roof and watched the cityscape as the sky darkened and the lights from the streets and windows grew sharp and beautiful. No matter how drab during the day, the city always showed her prettier face after dark.

Once he had painted. He'd discovered the talent early in his teen years and developed it through college. He couldn't remember exactly when he'd stopped, only that at one point his job and life had seemed to overshadow such a trivial pursuit. Kim had found some of his old stuff one day and told him it was good and that he should pursue it. He never had.

Tonight, this view, would make a good picture, he decided. He smiled. It was stupid to be thinking this way now. He sat against the raised wall that separated him from the drop on the other side and swung his legs over. The cool evening air actually felt good against his bare feet.

He had developed no time-line for killing himself, so he sat there and enjoyed the sensation of being above everything. Closing his eyes he felt moisture trickle down his cheek and evaporate against his skin.

If he stood where he sat a breeze would come eventually and carry him off into nothing. If he kept his eyes closed he would feel like he was floating for the last few seconds.

The picture of Kim intruded into his thoughts. God, he wished he'd taken it with him from the office. He wanted it with him right now. He didn't like the thought of someone else taking it when he was dead.

There was nothing to be done about it now. He opened his eyes and felt more tears escape down his face.

A black silhouette on the far wall caught his eye and he stopped. It moved and two yellow orbs appeared under two triangular shapes as the cat watched him.

"You aren't up here to jump, too, are you?" he said

The orbs vanished and reappeared as the cat blinked.

Something about the way the cat was situated against the backdrop of the city struck him in a way he hadn't felt in a long time.

Back in his apartment he knew he had some of his old painting supplies buried somewhere. He wondered if the cat would still be here if he left and came back. He doubted it. But still, he could try, couldn't he? After all, the ledge and the concrete below weren't going anywhere.

He wondered if someone would buy a picture like that. Somehow the loneliness of it, the way it grabbed something deep inside him, made Harry think they just might. He wondered what the life of a painter was like, if he could make it doing something like that.

He moved off the ledge and waited to see if the cat would bolt. The orbs simply moved to watch him. He walked back to his shoes and put them on. The cat watched him and stayed where it was.

Harry decided. He would paint the picture. He would have to get a hold of the apartment manager to let him back in, and it would take a while to find his supplies. Once he did all that he would come back up here and try to paint the picture of the cat on the ledge against the city at night. He would do that, and when he was done he would see how he felt. Like he'd told himself, he could always jump after he was done.

Opening the door to the stairs he turned to look at the cat. It was still there and showed no sign of moving.

"Stay," Harry said, and disappeared into the stairwell.